Week 1. Show & Tell.

OK... I started the Herbalife program last Saturday. So today is D-DAY, my Week 1 result.

Weight - 60.2kg (from 62kg)
Bust - 36" (from 38")
Waist - 32" (from 34.5")
Hips - 38.5" (from 40")
Upper arm - 11" (from 12")
Thigh - 20.5" (from 22")
Lower Calf - 14.5" (from 15")
Total - 1.8kg weight loss and 9" all around.

Isn't that just awesome?? I am so amazed at this result. I thought I was going to use the money-back guarantee! LOL...

And you know what the best thing was? I did not feel hungry. On Day 1 and 2, I did feel a bit of hunger around meal times, but by Day 3, I didn't even feel like having my 2nd shake of the day. Yesterday, I caught up with Ruey and Felicity at McDonald's. Kids had a play and we sat and chat. I got there at 10.20am... got 2 hash browns for the kids, and stayed till lunch time. Kids wanted their Happy Meals so they did. I did not even feel like pinching their french fries! For the 2 hours I was there, I did not feel any urge to eat, not even my favourite fries.

So a big pat on my back! :) :) :) WHOOOO HOO!!!!

I did a Christmas show and tell for Jane, Crafty Matters. I did a layout and a card.

Layout - I used the Chrissy Mini Album kit papers, the Chrissy Squiggle card, and a Christmas tree ceramic.

Card - I used a bisque ceramic.... coloured it in with Stampin' Up wonder crayons, stamped it and then used Zig Dual brush pen to colour in the red, and finally used some bling.


We have a 4-year-old birthday party to go to. So I did a birthday card, it's for Zack, Peter's cousin's son, but I call him my nephew anyway. :)


My next few projects - two CJs from The Scrapbook Establishment CJ group, and my Pay-It-Forward RAKS... yes, I'm waaaaaay late, I'm sorry girls but it's still coming, and Christmas cards.

That's all for today. Going to measure myself again, still can't quite believe the measurements. LOL...

My Last Sin

I signed up for Herbalife on Tuesday. So excited about it. Since I've had kids, the weight has just slowly crept onto my body. I'm not excessively overweight, but I'd like to keep it under control while it is still manageable. I'm not ambitious or unrealistic, I don't want to have just skin on bones. I still want my curves.... *ahem* just at the right place, thanks! And most importantly, I hated the feeling of constantly having to buy new clothes next size up. Outgrowing clothes can only be a good thing if you are a baby. I've got soooo many clothes in my wardrobe that are nice, and I used to spend good money on them too. But they are just sitting in there doing nothing for me. And here I am, always wearing baggy clothes to cover my muffin tops (the overhang over your jeans) and 'fidubulous' (a fancy name for the flabby bits under your arms). No plans on getting into a Size 8... but Size 10 would be good.... Aussie size that is.

So! Last night, I decided we should go for a drive. Instead of going to a crop at Carolyn's, I convinced Peter to drive us to Carolyn's to drop off her AMM Totes, and then we went and visit friends of ours who live around the corner from Carolyn's. When we left at 9.30pm, we decided to go to Krispy Kreme to commit my last sin. I must admit, I don't have many bad eating habits. I don't snack between meals, I don't drink alcohol, I don't smoke, I don't even have sugar with my tea. I have soy milk for breakfast, and we have stopped doing weekly fish n chips! So I gather that I must be eating lots to have 10kg to lose. And I haven't had a donut in at least 1/2 a year. So I believe this can be my last indulgence before my Herbalife programme starts tomorrow.

We drove. Templestowe (north-east?) to Narre Warren (FAR south-east) .... probably a 45 min drive. There were KKs closer to Templestowe but they weren't bakeries. We HAD to go to the one that bakes.... 24 hours to get the fresh ones. It was also quite an adventure for the kids too. This store has the whole donut making process in plain sight, like a fish tank. They were absolutely fascinated. I was waiting in the car, and I could see Ellen darting from Peter to the viewing gallery, to and fro, to and fro, to and fro. LOL... We went home, had our KKs... and I was ready to start my new day with KK, sorry I mean Herbalife.

An oxymoron kind of photo..... Good and Evil, God and Satan, Dr Phil and Jerry Springer...


OK. Let's start recording my weight loss.
20 Oct 2007 - 62kg, 34.5" waist

My favourite tunes right now...

Just had to share these 2 video clips. First one is of Ricki-Lee, cos I think she's so hot now.




And then if you are Melbournian.... you might have seen the Nova 100.3FM commercial with the Nova Boy dancing to this tune...



Phaedon is absolutley hooked on this tune. He would do the Nova Boy too when this commercial plays. LOL...

slang. bloglines. red.

Last week, I received an email from Jess. It had an attachment of the Australian Citizenship Test. It is a new test where permanent residents / immigrants have to take before they approve your citizenship to Australia. Of course I had to look right? Thinking it was the real deal, I nearly crapped my pants cos there is no way I will pass that test. When they finally told me that it was just a spoof, I had a good laugh... and so I embarked on my "research" on this topic - Aussie slang. Here's some I learned (I already know quite a few myself, proud to say...LOL)

Died in my arse = pretty much like I crapped my pants or I shit myself
Drained a few tinnies = drank a few cans of beer
Flashing a brown eye = basically.... I think this means mooning
Taking a slash = peeing in the bush
Getting paraletic = getting drunk (very drunk)
Flat out like a lizard drinking = busy (I never knew lizards drank!)
Off like a bride's nightie OR Off like a bucket of prawns in the sun = left quickly
Dry as a nun's nasty OR Dry as a dead dingo's donger = Thirsty
(btw... nun's nasty is a nun's 'down there' .... and dingo is an Australia wild dog, donger is slang for a man's 'thing down there')

Aren't they just the funniest things to say? You wonder why they would go through so much trouble? Talk about verbal diarrhoea! LOL...

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Yesterday, I was talking to Ruey about keeping up with blogs. I have Bloglines... and I have a list of 35 feeds. To me, that is already quite a big list. Everytime I want to add a new one on, I feel that I had to review my list, to see who I can delete (i.e. housekeeping) because I simply can't keep up! Everyday I look at my Bloglines, and when there is a number showing up in brackets, I feel that I have to go read them. It's like a to-do task. It's like having unread emails. It's highlighted, it's in bold, it's PRESSURE! I don't know how some people can have an endless list of blogs on their bloglines. They must manage their time very well! Or is it a bad case of hoarding (one day she might blog about something really interesting and funny)? LOL.... OK, in saying that, don't delete mine off your Bloglines, OK? :) :) :)

Oh... and Crop For Kids too. :) :) :)

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I was in the study most of Monday. I had to take a break and go sit with my kids for a bit. So I sat next to my son, who was lying on the couch watching TV. I started cuddling him, and snuggling him, and kissing him.... and obviously I'm now interrupting his TV time. He was quite annoyed and said out loud "Stop doing that! I can't see!! Go do some computer work!"

Consider myself told.

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Peter got me a new mobile phone - Nokia 6300 .... and it's RED!!!

Bought it on Monday morning via eBay, seller posted it out in the afternoon, courier attempted to deliver it on Tuesday morning .... and I wasn't at home to receive it. DANG!!!! Will go pick it up next day.

Anyway, that's all I have to share at the moment. Not a lot of layouts because I'm working on my last brief for FK. It has been a wonderful experience. All the best to the next team!

Good evening.

He arrived but not his....

Where is everyone?!?!! Is anyone still reading my blog? Has everyone left because I've been whinging about my husband???? LOL...

Well... he came home, safe and sound on Friday .... but his luggage didn't. They went for a round the world trip to London. So he came home without ALL OUR PRESSIES!!!! How disappointing!!!!!!! Kids really missed him so much, so did I. I can hear some of you go.... awwwwwwwww Even though it was 9am in the morning, my savvy daughter has already suggested we should go out for lunch. So we went home for him to have a shower, I rushed out a layout for FK.... and off we went. Out to lunch.

For the rest of the day.... he pretty much slept all afternoon, so did the kids! So I had my quiet time before I went out for my Crop For Kids meeting. As much as I missed him, I also missed my me time. I needed to have a 60km radius away from the kids. So we had our meeting and a mini crop afterwards. I helped make a few cards for the Pink Card Drive. Even though I didn't register, I made 4 cards... for Carolyn who has registered. And people who know me probably know that cards are not my strongest suit. Ironically, I have a few cards coming up in For Keeps Issue #60.

My online class for the Cake Slice gift box went well. It's my first teaching experience, and I think I did all right. :) Hopefully someone will tell me if I'm doing anything wrong.

Of course, the luggage arrived at our doorstep on Sunday. So kids got all their shoes and toys, I got my stamp and what I ordered, and the very-hard-to-find Ilford Smooth Pearl photo papers 4x6 in 100s ... everyone was happy.

Ellen goes back to kinder tomorrow for the last term, and this marks my countdown of our trip to Singapore!

TWO last things! Design-A-Chippie competition deadline gets extended, and a new online class at Crop for Kids by Jill Geraghty-Groves - GRUNGE! Read all about it here.


That's all and ta-ta for now.

He'll be coming home tomorrow when he comes.... yeehah!

You know the things you learn to do when your husband is not at home?

Well, I learned how to change a down light the other day. One of the down lights in my kitchen blew some time middle of last week. It was the light that covers the fridge and kitchen bench corner. It didn't matter which light really .. but when you have a blown light bulb, it makes you feel like you are missing something, so uncomfortable, so incomplete. I thought I could test myself to see if I could last the 1.5 weeks without changing it. By day 4 I gave up. One of those phone calls to him was asking him how on earth do I change a friggin down light.... cos it's not quite the same as changing a normal light bulb. So I did it. I changed a down light. And I had this overwhelming sense of satisfaction and mighty proud of myself.

I bought a few things online in the US and made sure they sent the package to him on time before he leaves. It arrived on time and safely, thank goodness. I also sent him to a stamp shop to buy some Stampington stamps I wanted. Poor man walked into the shop with the product codes and names I gave him, only to find that the shop arranges by designs, eg butterflies, flowers, .... etc. He had to ring me at 2am our time, to ask me to describe the stamps for him. hehehe....

I've also done a lot of damage doing retail therapy. How else is a girl to channel her loneliness and stress?? I finally got hold of the I *Heart* Candy Town collection from SisTV when they launched their boutique on 1st October, and even got 10% discount. I missed out on this kit the last time they had it in August.... and I was sooooo heartbroken. A few days after I missed out, I emailed them to sob about it, emailed Adrienne Looman to sob about it.... then the customer service guy from SiSTV replied with a top secret! He told me that "rumours" have been going around that something "big" is happening in October and they are revamping, and they "might" have that available again. So he told me to have my eyes peeled! How much more gorgeous can a customer service guy be??!!!

So anyways, 1 more sleep, my hubby dearest is coming home tomorrow morning. Sigh.... 2 weeks. My SIL rang last night.... asking how I've been coping. I said she should be asking to speak to my children, if they were still here ... if I had done a Desperate-Housewife-Lynnette and driven them somewhere and left them standing by the street! I have to say I managed pretty well. We had a few play dates and that kept us busy, and a few (too many) lazy pyjamas days where we stayed at home. Kids had some good play time outside when the weather was good. I had to work on my Crop For Kids online class material and a couple of FK DT layouts. So overall, we did well. My son has already banished me. He got upset with me a few times because I told him off and stopped him from doing something naughty. He said I can't cuddle him cos Daddy will do it when he comes back on Friday; he said I am not allowed to take him to the playcentre anymore and Daddy will take him, cos I refused to buy him a toy with lollies. Where do they send ungrateful kids?

Anyways, my online class is happening to night, at 7.30pm (2.5hours to go). I might as well post the pics here now. I am making the Cake Slice Gift Box. $10.00 for the template and instructions (for blue box), fully donated to Royal Children's Hospital's Good Friday Appeal.



Variation....



Interested to have the template? Email me to let me know.

Enjoy the rest of the week. I know I will... cos Peter is coming home tomorrow!!